Wide Open: Jeremy Maclin on The Big Picture and Bye Weeks

_Jeremy Maclin, 23, is in his third season in the NFL, as a starting wide receiver in the Philadelphia Eagles’s vaunted offense. A two-time All American at Missouri, Maclin was selected 19th overall in the 2009 Draft. Last season, Maclin made 70 catches for 964 yards. Once a week this fall, exclusively here at GQ.com, Maclin will deliver a new post that takes readers behind the scenes of the Eagles’ much-hyped 2011 season—and into the private, off-field life of a young NFL star. _

Bye week is a little bit strange emotionally. But it’s relaxing, of course: I went home to St. Louis for three days. Guys spend time with their families. Guys go out. Guys unwind. I play a lot of Call of Duty (HUGE fan of that game). But at the same time, I get a little bit antsy, especially on Sunday. I honestly wish I could be out there playing. Because of that, I can’t really focus on watching one game, so I flip around a lot between all the games. When I’m not on the field, I’m just a fan of football. I don’t pay much attention to individual players—except for Danario Alexander, a receiver for the Rams, and Sean Weatherspoon, a linebacker for the Falcons. I played with both of them at Mizzou, and they’re two of my best friends. They’re the guys I check in on.

Speaking of Mizzou, looks like there’s a better than likely chance we’ll be in the SEC. I think that’s good for the university—financially, recruiting-wise, and with respect to fans. The SEC is just an exciting conference. Not that I have any regrets about my time in the Big 12. I had opportunities to play in the SEC, but I’m just happy and grateful I got to play at the University of Missouri. Wouldn’t change a thing.

With respect to relaxation and going out, there’s an image of NFL players, and pro athletes in general, going to clubs, being kinda loud, maybe acting arrogant and not treating the people with too much respect. That image exists because it does happen sometimes, and when it does there’s usually a big story about it the next day. It’s news. But to my experience, there’s nothing at all newsworthy about players unwinding. A lot of guys have wives and kids, and they unwind by spending time with their families. Most of the rest of us don’t even go to bars and clubs—we usually don’t go out at all during the week, and when we do, after games or on our day off, it’s just dinner at a restaurant. The cycle of our in-season lives is so focused, so competitive, that it can be kind of special to get together with the other guys in a low-key, "out of the office" setting. We talk about football, make jokes about things that happened in practice. We sit back and reflect on the bigger picture.

By "bigger picture" I guess I mean that football is about mental and physical toughness and all these things, but we’re not just football players. We’re human beings first and foremost. There’s a very close relationship between the two. Everything we learn in life—as husbands, fathers, sons, brothers, friends—gets us ready to play football. Everything we learn on the football field makes us better equipped to deal with life.

Look at how things went for Jerome Harrison. He gets traded to us a little while back. Nobody likes to be traded, and have to pick up and move. But during the mandatory physical that goes with a trade, they found a brain tumor, and he took responsibility and got it taken care of. I’m especially sympathetic to his situation, because of what I went through this past summer. We play a game in which any of us could potentially suffer a career-threatening injury on any play. But we also live in a life in which things come at you out of nowhere. That’s where the football toughness comes into the bigger picture, and that’s also where it becomes vital that we make the effort to step out of the football zone once in a while, sit down in a restaurant, and treat each other—and ourselves—as normal people. Jerome was with us last year; we hung out. I wish him all the best and a speedy recovery—first as a human being, and then as a football player.

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